Crusades

Like Saladin, who controlled his image carefully, ISIS have proved shrewd operators in the propaganda war, focusing on their primary constituency: young motivated jihadists, keen to give humiliate outside interlopers and beat them at their own game.

Whether we choose authors and titles that are popular or not, or on lists or not, it doesn't really matter. What matters is how we choose them - allowing ourselves to be randomly led from one title to the next via researching and web searching in a leisurely, sideways and random fashion.